Pedal power for Newark Patriotic Fund

A 24-hour static bike challenge was completed for Newark Patriotic Fund.

Three Newark and Sherwood district councillors — Neill Mison, Keith Girling and Johno Lee — organised the ride at Newark Sports and Fitness Centre, and were in the core team of cyclists.

They were joined by Matthew Roe, who was originally only going to do a couple of hours but instead pedalled throughout the night with the main team.

Neill pedalled 250 miles, Keith completed 144, Matthew did 87 and Johno 62.

The aim was to ride the equivalent distance from Land’s End to John O’Groats — a total of 950 miles.

They reached that after 18 hours and carried on to complete a total of 1,109 miles.

Friends joined them on the challenge along with volunteers who came forward after seeing posts on social media.

Kev Jones stayed into the small hours and completed five miles; Ian Driver completed 40 miles on Friday, Rebecca Bloomfield and Matt Quinton both clocked up 37 miles, and Dawn and Matthew Woodward went on Friday and Saturday and rode 35 and 37 miles each.

Other riders included Chris Barns, Brenda Collins, Steve Collins, Matt Skinner, Linda Bourne and Ray Purvis.

There were also contributions from six children, including Neill’s nine-year-old son, William, who pedalled 17 miles.

Neil said they grateful to everybody who took part, as well as those who took food and drink to keep them going.

Keith, chairman of the patriotic fund, is planning to complete 300 miles round the battlefields of northern France this summer and said the challenge had been good preparation.

Neill is completing a series of running and cycling challenges this year to raise money for the fund.

His next event is the 101-mile Altura Nottinghamshire Wheeler Sportive event from Southwell Racecourse on July 22. He will then tackle the Bournemouth Marathon in October.

Donations can be made at https://mydonate.bt.com/fundraisers.neillmison1

The councillors have raised £600 to date.